Thank you for your email expressing interest in the route of the party which abducted Kreipe in WW2. Please accept my apologies for and excuse a standard reply but I get many requests for information about the abduction of General Kreipe and the route that the various parties took and writing individual replies is just too time consuming. I hope though that you will understand why, but also pick up some tips.

The website www.illmetbymoonlight.info is very much a work in progress and as things are I struggle to find the time to work on it and other  related projects without finding time for dealing with individual and often complex enquiries. At present it does not have precise details of the route our expeditions have taken. There are several reasons for this. Firstly the record is not connected to any commercial venture of any sort but consists of contributions from a number of people sharing an interest. All these people have other commitments that take up their time on top of their day to day jobs. None of us has any interest in making any money out of this project and we have refused all financial offers in the past and I intend to do so in the future. We are involved because we are interested in the people, the details and historical record. In the past, one or more of us have offered assistance to various film companies etc but we have been very disappointed with the final results. We do not wish to be associated with inaccurate versions of events that may find their way into the historical record. We have also received requests from people presenting as private individuals only to learn that they have wanted the research we have done, for free, so that they can use it for there own personal gain and as the basis for their organised tours and the like. As usual in life, it is the minority who have ruined things for the majority who share a genuine interest in the events.

Secondly, one of our prime considerations has been the Cretan people who live in the villages that the route passes through. We take the view that we should not publish material that might result in hoards of visitors (the route is of interest to very many people) without having first established how the locals feel about it and what it may mean for them. We are engaged in the process of consulting them with a view to whether it may be in their interests to make the fine detail of the route available to all via the internet.

We are also concerned with detail and as yet are still not agreed on some details of the route, we are still fine tuning our findings. It is not sufficient for us to say, for example, "the party left from a beach near Rhodaniko", we want to know which beach near Rhodakino. Solid reliable information is not easy to come by. None of the primary participants made an accurate contemporary records that we can find; some accounts were reconstructed from notes at various later intervals. Supporting evidence, such as naval operational records which are on the website, may conflict to some degree with the one known map that was generated soon after the abduction. And so it goes on. Verbal accounts from friends and relatives, of the wider group of Cretans who had an involvement, may contradict other accounts and need to be critically compared with other available evidence. All this takes time of course.

Since Greece has been a member of the EC, many roads have been constructed for shepherds to use. In consequence, old footpaths have grown over or been lost in some other way. A number have 6 foot high fencing across them. In our view it is no longer possible to travel the entire exact route, even were it all known in detail. Read any book about walking in Crete and you will see that people get lost easily, that it can be very dangerous in parts, and that it is often very demanding on footwear and the like.

In 1944, parts of Crete along the southern coastline were a prohibited area, only a few shepherds were tolerated. As the late leader of the abduction, Paddy Leigh Fermor once told me, "the shepherds were our guides. At times the group were taken to places in the dark by these local guides and the abduction team never saw parts of the route in daylight- and so couldn't recognise them in daylight". The weather can also be a major issue, particularly I am told across Psiloriti when there is snow on the ground. I am not a climber or hiker, I am the researcher but I do know that the advice given to many walkers is to have a local guide, indeed we did so on our last expedition and we hope to on the next.

The best advice I can give anyone wanting to do any part of the route at the moment is to use what information is available at the moment, it is far more than when we started out. Reading Ill Met by Moonlight (Billy Moss) is a must - but don't get hung up on the fine detail. I would also recommend The Cretan Runner by George Psychoundakis. George was not directly involved but you will get a good feel for the place, and Cretans, from his writings. Dig about www.illmetbymoonlight.info. There is a lot of information there even though it isn't very ordered at present. Ignore the film Ill Met By Moonlight for helpful detail purposes - it was filmed in France and Italy so don't think you will recognise anywhere. We were told by Paddy to trust the Cretans, as he did, and of course he was right. They are wonderful people, helpful, generous and they made the abduction possible. Paddy wrote somewhere about virtually every Cretan knowing, via the Cretan grapevine, about the abduction and the passage of Kreipe across Crete-but none gave anything away. One of the best parts of our research has been the interaction with Cretan people. On the difficult parts around Psiloriti seek out a Cretan guide. It obviously helps to know a little Greek, especially in the more remote parts but many do get by knowing just a few words such as please and thank you. Our greatest advantage, which is sadly no longer available to anyone, was knowing Paddy, having his map, a letter of introduction from him and his advice and support. His advice was to trust in the Cretans and if you do that you will not go wrong.

Practicalities. Crete is generally a very safe place, local Cretans are thoroughly trustworthy. However there are now a small number of people from outside of Crete who might have their own ideas about your property. They are few but gone are the days when you could leave your valuable around in the open knowing they would be untouched for days. Many parts of the route are in wilder parts where you really must take care, and water etc. Do not expect a mobile signal to be available everywhere to call for help. Accommodation. Not all the villages en route will have 'rooms' available so try and check ahead, ask in local shops and tavernas about the area ahead. Although holes in the wall are now becoming far more in number, do not expect them in every village, think ahead. Taxis used to be cheap if you don't have a support driver, but now buses may be the best way of getting to those places from where you intend to walk. People still hitch, indeed half expect elderly locals to look for a lift up long hills to their village as they come back from market or whatever.

 

We are firm believers in interacting with local people as the way to get the best out of any walking trips in Crete. If you do as you have suggested and try and cover part of the route then I am confident that you will conclude that it would be wrong of us to provide a complete breakdown of the route along with all the advice needed to do it. You have, dare I suggest, far more information readily available that any of us started out with. We would hate to see it become anything like the Samaria Gorge, coach trips from all over the island, lots of people ill-equipped for the journey, and lots of foreigners making money out of the locals. 

 

I hope that you do manage to find the time to take part of the route on at some stage, and that once you have done so, that you will better understand our reluctance to tell all. Do please check the website from time to time as we are always working on some aspect and may well provide additional helpful information.

Tim Todd

February 2012